Background: Interview with artist and influencer Jenny Kiker to align her lush green home decor with Pantone’s 2017 Color of the Year (Greenery). 

A Living Pattern print is all about balance. White space and a careful mix of paints combine to bring Jenny Kiker’s sun-dappled, tropical world to canvas.

Jenny works and lives out of her home studio in Delray Beach, Florida. Her desk is strategically placed under a window to flood her space with natural light. Her greenery models—palms, rubber plants, monstera, and other tropicals—frame her desk.

A graduate of the lauded Savannah College of Art and Design, Jenny’s path to success has taken many forms. In 2013, she was a textile designer at a children’s clothing company while also merchandising window displays for Urban Outfitters, and illustrating on the side.

“I was designing squirrel prints for little girls dresses,” she recalls. “Painting and illustrations were my thing and I felt I wasn’t being used to my fullest. I kind of quit my job ungracefully with no plan and no savings,” she laughs, “I was forced to make a living off of my passion. So I started painting anything and everything. I was drawing insects, animals, even pet portraits for a while.”

In a stroke of serendipity, Jenny’s fiancé came home one day with an armful of plants.

“He said, ‘Here. Why don’t you paint these?’ and that was kind of that,” she says.

That moment kickstarted an obsession that she leveraged into a business and a drive to become “a self-taught botanist.” Her success was accelerated by the timely design trend to incorporate more plant life into the home.

Pantone naming Greenery as their 2017 Color of the Year was also a boon to Jenny’s business.

“I got so lucky there,” says Jenny—who was approached by Pantone to bring Greenery to life on their feed through a series of Instagram posts that highlighted her work.

Jenny readily embraces the flow between her outdoor and indoor spaces. She describes her own style as “modern tropical mid-century.”

“I love the flow of green inside and outside my space. It makes me feel like I’m outside and so inspires me,” she says.

When selecting pieces for her studio space, Jenny stuck to a neutral palette of camels, creams, whites and incorporated statement green tones with her artwork and her Sven armchair.

“My studio is a sanctuary and every time I sit here and do my work, I look over at my living room and think, ‘Would I want to put this artwork up in this room?’. I’m essentially creating pieces for the room that I have and using the beauty I surround myself with as a benchmark for the quality of my work,” she says.

“I don’t like detail or decorative additions. I love things that are clean, simple, functional — which is part of why I love Article so much. The furniture is very clean and modern but still has a lot of cosiness to it,” says Jenny.

The most important thing in her studio?

“The light,” she says without hesitation. “It dictated the entire setup of the room. Where my desk is, where other artificial light sources were placed. Everything.”